Ramesh Kumar & Co vs. ACIT (ITAT Mumbai)

The AO has made the addition as some of the suppliers of the assessee were declared Hawala dealer by the Sales tax Department. This may be a good reason for making further investigation but the AO did not make any further investigation and merely completed the assessment on suspicion. Once the assessee has brought on record the details of payments by account payee cheque, it was incumbent on the AO to have verified the payment details from the bank of the assessee and also from the bank of the suppliers to verify whether there was any immediate cash withdrawal from their account. No such exercise has been done. The CIT(A) has also confirmed the addition made by the AO by going on the suspicion and the belief that the suppliers of the assessee are Hawala traders. We also find that no effort has been made to verify the work done by the assessee from the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai. We agree with the submissions of the Counsel that if there were no purchases, the assessee would not have been in a position to complete the civil work. On civil contract receipts of Rs. 32.05 crores, the assessee has shown gross profit at 14.2% and net profit at 9.72%. Even if for the sake of argument, the books of accounts are rejected, the profit has to be computed on the sales made by the assessee U/s. 44AD of the Act, the presumptive profit in case of civil contractors is 8% and in case of a partnership firm, a further deduction is allowed in respect of salary and interest paid to the partners. The ratio analysis of the profitability is also in favour of the assessee. In our considered opinion, the purchases are supported by proper invoices duly reflected in the books of account. The payments have been made by account payee cheque which are duly reflected in the bank statement of the assessee. There is no evidence to show that the assessee has received cash back from the suppliers. The additions have been made merely on the report of the Sales tax Department but at the same time it cannot be said that purchases are bogus.